explaining_errors_in_star_trekfandomcom-20200215-history
Persistence of Vision
'' |image= |series= |production=40840-124 |producer(s)= |story= |script=Jeri Taylor |director=James L. Conway |imdbref=tt0708945 |guests=Patrick Kerr as Telepathic Botha, Stan Ivar as Mark, Michael Cumpsty as Lord Burleigh, Thomas Dekker as Henry Burleigh, Lindsey Haun as Beatrice Burleigh, Carolyn Seymour as Mrs. Templeton, Warren Munson as Admiral Paris and Marva Hicks as T'Pel |previous_production=Parturition |next_production=Tattoo |episode=VGR S02E08 |airdate= October 30, 1995 |previous_release=(VGR) Parturition (Overall) Indiscretion |next_release=(VGR) Tattoo (Overall) Rejoined |story_date(s)= 49037.2 |previous_story=Rejoined |next_story=Little Green Men }} Summary As Voyager readies for a potentially dangerous encounter with the Botha, the Doctor orders an exhausted Captain Janeway to take some "R&R" in the holodeck. Janeway tries to get into her favorite holonovel, a story in the fashion of Jane Eyre, but before long, she is called back to the Bridge for first contact with the Botha. The Botha representative gives the crew a chilly reception, but sets up a rendezvous to determine whether or not they will allow Voyager to pass through their space. Aboard Voyager, Captain Janeway starts seeing characters and objects from her holonovel. Later, Janeway thinks she sees Beatrice, the little girl from her holonovel, in one of the ship's corridors. Unable to attribute Beatrice's appearance to experiments the crew is performing on Voyager's imaging systems, Janeway wonders if she's seeing things. Janeway goes to see Neelix to review her routine and see if anything she saw was real. She reviews the lunch menu, and ends with cucumber-sandwiches with fine china tea-cups. Neelix points out that there wasn't any cucumber-sandwich as she recalled or fine china tea-cups. Janeway goes to sick-bay and The Doctor can't find a single thing wrong with her brain. After Kes is asked to get a medical tool for the Doctor, Janeway sees Beatrice and then Kes sees Beatrice, too (But Beatrice is transparent to her). The Doctor orders Janeway to her quarters for rest until he can determine the source of this event. Later, after Janeway hears the voice of her fiancé, Mark from Earth, she's attacked with a knife by Mrs. Templeton, another holonovel character, cutting her hand in the palm. Again, Kes confirms the event, only for it to be a hallucination while Janeway is still in sick-bay from the previous scene. Janeway puts Chakotay in charge of meeting with the Botha while she undergoes medical testing. Once again, the alien representative is hostile and this time, his ship engages the crew in a battle, damaging Voyager. Leaving Sickbay, Janeway races to the Bridge, where the Bothan is on the viewscreen. Soon afterwards, the crew begins entering a catatonic state one-by-one, with only Kes and the Doctor remaining unaffected. She's stunned to see it is Mark, at least, that is how it looks to her. However, on the same viewscreen, Tom Paris sees his disparaging father, Admiral Paris (not the same actor who plays Admiral Paris in later episodes); Harry Kim sees his girlfriend Libby; and Tuvok sees his wife T'Pel. Each having separate visions based on each of their perspective characters. B'Elanna Torres contacts Janeway from Engineering and reports that the crew seems to have fallen under some kind of psychoactive trance, the result of a bio-electric field emanating from the Botha ship. Chakotay arrives to aid Torres, but communications seem down. Nonetheless, even as she begins working on a way to block the field, she falls prey to its spell: Chakotay and her in a romantic embrace. On the Bridge, Paris finally succumbs to the trance and Janeway heads to deck 11, seeing Chakotay entranced in the turbo-lift. As Janeway's illusion of Mark kisses her, she becomes a victim as well, and can no longer move freely. Kes and the Doctor are all that remain of the crew. Kes, whose telepathic abilities allow her to resist the field, and the Doctor are left to block the mysterious force that is disabling the ship help the others to stop the psionic-field causing this. Kes realizes that she is slowly being affected by this illusion when Paris tries to keep her from Engineering. Kes calls the Doctor, informs him of the situation. Neelix arrives, but Kes sees he is a hallucination when he tries to stop her. She resists and manages to complete Torres' work which restores the crew to normal. A telepathic Botha confesses to having caused the disturbance, because he could; but, he disappears before they can learn any more from him. As they continue on their way, the crew reflects uneasily about what is lurking in the subconscious corridors of their minds. Errors and Explanations Internet Movie Database Plot holes # When Voyager is attacked by the Bothan, Janeway calls for Kes to join her on the bridge, and Kes acknowledges with "Right away." However, Kes never shows up; in fact, she never even leaves sickbay, as can be seen later. Although Janeway was influenced by the Bothan at the time of her call, she was not yet fully delusional, and nothing indicates that her communication with Kes was not genuine. This could be a symptom of the Bothan's influence. # At the end of the show Captain Janeway says that they cannot be certain that the alien was ever even on the ship. Although people were hallucinating, and while under that influence they could be feed incorrect information from the ships computer as part of that hallucination, telepathy does not affect technology so once everyone was no longer under the influence of the alien a quick check of the ships internal sensor logs should have shown if there had been an alien intruder or not. The Bothan may have been able to alter the logs to remove any proof. # Scene 1: At sickbay, Janeway saw the girl from holonovel standing in front of her. She asked doctor to check if he can see anyone around. The doctor looked around, but could not see anyone else. Scene 2: Towards the end of the show, when Kes was at the engineering, attacked by hallucinated Neelix. The doctor reminded Kes to look at the hallucinated Neelix, "look at him, remember the mirror?". How was the doctor not able to see Janeway's hallucination right in the sickbay, but was able to see Kes' hallucination via Engineering monitor? Perhaps the camera providing footage for the monitor was also under the Bothan's influence, but the EMH was immune? Continuity # Near the end, when Janeway gets in the turbolift to go from the Bridge to Engineering, she looks over and sees Chakotay in the catatonic state, but when the turbolift doors open, she is the only one inside. While the figure of Mark is understood to be her hallucination, there's no indication Chakotay was, as well. There is no indication that it wasn't! Nit Central # The Mad Bothan on Friday, May 31, 2002 - 1:35 pm: Noticing that Janeway is somewhat stressed, the doctor said that he checked Starfleet regulations and found out that the doctor of the ship has the authority to relieve her from duty, and told her to relax in the holodeck. Wouldn't he be programmed with these regulations anyway, considering they're medical related? He shouldn't need to do any checking! He may not have had any reason to check them before now. # '' Anonymous on Tuesday, September 17, 2002 - 4:49 pm:'' Out of all the options Janeway mentioned to stop the bad guy at the end, she misses one: Execute him. He assaulted her crew, and ship, what he did to their minds was nothing short of a type of rape. He was a threat to any other ship that was in that region of space. If she had decided to execute, she could have said self defence and she would be technically correct, so why doesn't she even mention that option. Two problems with that suggestion; 1) The rest of the Bothan civilisation would have attacked Voyager in order to avenge the death. 2) Janeway would have to submit to court martial when Voyager returned home. Category:Episodes Category:Voyager